Developing a quality of care index for outpatient methadone treatment programmes

This article describes the development and evaluation of a psychometric instrument for assessing quality of care in outpatient methadone substitution therapy (MST) programmes. The instrument, termed the Quality of Care Index-1 (QCI-1), is a seven-item scale evaluated in two studies. Its psychometric properties are consistently acceptable across both studies. The QCI-1 reveals three distinct quality criteria relevant to the condition of the patients in methadone treatment. These are drug use hygiene, sharing of injecting equipment and partner's drug use status.